


Betters

by Kestrel_Sparhawk



Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Class Issues, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-12
Packaged: 2018-03-01 03:45:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2758376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kestrel_Sparhawk/pseuds/Kestrel_Sparhawk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam's supposed to listen to his betters, but what if they're telling him the wrong thing?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Betters

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this long ago under the pen name Lost Owl. Now I'm trying to move all my slash fic to a central location. It's still in the original archive West of the Moon, where there's some really good slash. If you're unfamiliar with it, and an LOTR fan, ya gotta check it out.) http://www.west-of-the-moon.net/servlet/SlashStoryListing?show=701. I hate to think of all the wonderful stories in every fandom no one's encountered, so think of this as a public service announcement.
> 
>  

### 

Wherever I go, there's someone sayin' listen to your betters.

Started with my own gaffer. He was my better, to hear him talk. He was definitely my elder. Had the power. Having power, could tell me what to do. Of course, when he said "betters," he thought he meant "gentry."

Listen to your betters. Do what they say.

But also, don't presume on your betters.

He meant Mr. Frodo, mostly.

Ever since I was a lad, Mr. Frodo and I have done things together my gaffer didn't approve of. First it was reading and writing. He taught, I learned.

Later it was exploring. He liked to go places, Mr. Frodo. I liked to go with him. Mr. Bilbo thought that was just fine. Gaffer thought I was asking for trouble.

I don't know if Mr. Frodo, deep down, thinks he's better than me. I doubt it. I've known him a long time, and he doesn't think he's better than anyone, really. Or worse. He's just himself.

Aren't many hobbits like that, in my experience. Maybe none but him.

"Don't judge, Sam," he's always saying, when I bring him news about gossip in town, or complain to him about Ted Sandyman or some other worthless git. "You don't know why they do what they do."

I figure I don't have to know why someone does something to know when they're doing it right and when they're doing it wrong.

But I try to do what Mr. Frodo says, always, because he may not think he's better than me, but I know he is.

Then Mr. Frodo is leaving the Shire, and he wants me along. Mr. Gandalf thinks I should go with him. And because they're my betters, my gaffer thinks I should go too.

That's fine with me. I would go no matter what t'gaffer thinks. Or what my betters think, for that matter. Where Mr. Frodo goes, I go.

Mr. Merry and Mr. Pippin, they come too. My gaffer thinks they're my betters too, but I can tell he also thinks they're not such as I should listen to overmuch. But they're good, loyal friends of Mr. Frodo, and they won't leave him to go off in the wild on his own, or even with just me.

And I'm glad for that, even though it makes it harder to keep my secret. And this one's a big one, that's hard to keep.

Always I've wanted Mr. Frodo's hand on me, his arm around me, my mouth on his. Even if he is gentry, and gentry and servants don't do such things together.

By now it's such an old wanting I don't think much about it, anymore, till something happens where we are together in a way, and we're not together, if you see what I mean.

Like Rivendell.

When he was sick, unconscious, it wasn't anything to think about. For one thing, all I could think about was him, and that evil blade, and the strange things that had been following him.

But after he was awake, it went back to the old apartness - him one of the gentry, me part of his baggage. The part with legs.

The first night at dinner was hardest, because I wanted to wait on him, and they said no. I was a guest.

Elves' rules are different, I guess - servants can be guests like gentry. If you were going to live forever, you might be more careful about keeping people in their place all the time, knowing thousands of years might ride on your rules.

So I sat next to gentry, and listened to their conversation, and watched them try to make conversation with me.

Mr. Merry and Mr. Pippin began to compare the elves' banquet with the ones they'd been to. I couldn't speak to that, never having been invited to any banquets before.

They told their adventures to the guests and elves around them. I suppose I could have helped, but they were doing a fine job, and I don't have the words. I agreed that Strider had been a fine helper, and I described the midge marshes in a way to make them laugh, because I could tell Mr. Merry wanted me to make them laugh.

That's my job, I guess. Mr. Frodo is the hero, Mr. Pippin and Mr. Merry are his friends, and I'm the fool.

That night I missed Mr. Frodo something fierce. He treats me like a friend, not the fool, even when Mr. Pippin and Mr. Merry are there.

After the banquet, Mr. Frodo went off with Mr. Bilbo. I went back and listened to the goings on in the hall, and the feelings got better. Mr. Bilbo spoke a fine piece, and then the elves sang beautiful songs. I'd heard Mr. Frodo sing some of what they sung, and he has a fine voice, but there's only one of him. In the hall, the harmonies came from everywhere, and it was beautiful to break the heart and make you weep. Which I did. My gaffer says I cry too much.

Later, I went to Mr. Bilbo's room and found a way to hint that maybe Mr. Frodo should be in bed. He was looking worn out, so I took him back to his own room.

When he climbed in to that great bed, he looked like a hobbit child, and even his face looked like a child, kind of frightened and lost.

"Sam," he said, "where are you sleeping?"

"I'm not sure, Mr. Frodo," I said, because I hadn't slept in a bed since we got there - leastways, not my own.

"Sam . . . " and he hesitated, like what he was going to ask was an awful big favor. "Sam, could you stay here tonight? I'm feeling far from home."

I didn't trust myself to say anything, just nodded, and climbed in next to him on that enormous bed. Even with the two of us, there was room for two more, at least. I moved right up next to him and put my arms around him. That felt so natural now, since I'd been sleeping that way since he'd been stabbed, first in the wild to keep him warm, then in his bed when he was hurt to keep him comforted. If I have to tell the truth, it was for my comforting too, he had looked so pale and felt so cold, I thought he might disappear entirely if I weren't wrapped around him holding him here.

He sighed a little, that sigh he makes when little things are right - when dinner was good, when the fire catches, times like that - and tucked his head under my arm, and closed his eyes.

I petted his head till he fell asleep.

When I woke up, he was sitting up and staring at me as if I were a stranger, and he was wondering what in the world I was doing in his bed.

I sat up right quick, and started to apologize, but he caught my arm.

"No, Sam, don't go. Please."

Well, I couldn't pull away of course, and anyway, I saw now his eyes were wet, so likely it weren't me he'd been staring at anyway. I sat there, wondering what to do next, and he smiled.

"Do you know, I'm hungry."

"Well, then, let's go find summat."

I did wonder what it was that had been making him sad, but there was a lot it could have been, all things considered. I did ask if his arm pained him, but he said it wasn't that.

We stayed at Rivendell a month, getting our strength back and planning for the journey, and waiting for scouts to report on the Black Riders. I stayed in Mr. Frodo's room, and his cousins stayed together, and if we'd dared, I think we'd all have stayed in the same bed, just so it would feel more the right size for us. The only hobbit-sized chairs and bed were in Mr. Bilbo's room.

We left just after Yule. It was the strangest Yule I ever kept. The elves don't observe Yule, at least not like us, so it wasn't like a real Yule at all. We did try to make it more like home. Mr. Merry and I went and got a Yule log and hauled it back. Mr. Bilbo had taught the elves long ago what a Yule feast should look like, and while hobbit food weren't to elvish taste, Elrond made sure we had a roast and all the other trimmings. It weren't exactly sensible to exchange presents, since we were all going on the road and hadn't come with much anyway, so we gave each other songs - and there was a lot of singing, foreyule and afteryule both, and good hobbit songs at that. Elvish music is lovely, but it's not homelike, and we all were missing home. Here it was, a new year, in a new place, and we didn't know where we'd be the next year, or even if we'd be at all, though we all pretended we weren't thinking that.

I think Mr. Frodo was pleased at how happy Mr. Bilbo was to celebrate Yule again. "There isn't much point, my dear boy, when you're the only one," he explained. Mr. Frodo and I talked about what present we might be able to give him. That was hard to come up with, but we finally wrote him a letter, telling him what it had meant to us for him to be with us while we were growing up. First Frodo, then me wrote. Mr. Frodo said I could read what he wrote, and it was much more beautiful than anything I could say. Basically I just said the most important thing Mr. Bilbo meant to me was that I could write the letter to him, because he taught me how, and he had made it easy for me to come with Mr. Frodo because of all he'd told me about elves and having adventures, and I was grateful. Mr. Frodo liked it, though.

Mr. Frodo, who draws much better than me, put some leaves and flowers on it, and we gave it to Mr. Bilbo foreYule in his room. He cried, which I hadn't ever seen him do before, and he hugged us both. He gave me a sharp knife he had, an elvish knife in a sheath, and he told Frodo he had a present for him too, but he'd give it to him privately.

The last week we were with Mr. Bilbo every day. Mr. Frodo and he talked a lot, and I mostly sat there and listened, just as we had all done in Hobbiton. Listening to them was like listening to the elves sing and tell stories - it was wise and wonderful and made me think and imagine things too.

The last morning, the day we left, Mr. Frodo was private with Mr. Bilbo, saying goodbye, and I was private with Bill, checking his tack and just talking. Bill was looking sleek and beautiful. Mr. Elrond and Mr. Gandalf had tried to talk me out of taking him, but he would have pined without me. The elves never rode him or took him out and about, because he was too small for them, and Bill was used to doing, like me.

Mr. Frodo came to find me in the stable just after lunch. "Are you ready to go, Sam?" he asked. His eyes were red, and I thought it had been hard on him to say goodbye to Mr. Bilbo.

"Yes, sir, all packed. I won't load Bill till just afore we go, of course. Is there aught I can do for you?"

"Yes, you can walk with me."

Well, going walking before a long journey might seem like an odd thing, but it wasn't if you knew Mr. Frodo. We went to our favorite places, and ended up at a tree that was thousands of years old, Elrond said.

We sat among the roots, and I waited for Mr. Frodo to say whatever it was he wanted to say.

He was silent for a time, and then he looked at me and laughed. "You know I have something to talk about, don't you, Sam?"

"Your eyes change color," I explained. "And they go a different shape, a little."

"I'll have to try to control that." But he wasn't serious. So he thought another second, and then he said, "I've been thinking about our journey."

I just waited. I knew one thing that was coming, but I wasn't sure about any other.

"You know, Sam, you don't have to come with me."

Well, so it was out. I'd been expecting it for weeks. Leave it to Mr. Frodo to think about how to say what he wanted to say until it was almost too late, just trying to make it perfectly clear.

"I didn't think you thought I had to . . ." I stopped, because of the sentence mostly, and tried again. "I know I don't have to come with you."

But he'd already rehearsed his speech. "I won't think less of you at all. In fact, I think you shouldn't come. It's risky, and one of us should be able to go back to the Shire and explain what happened to the others."

That hurt. "And you think I'd rather go back to the Shire and tell Mr. Merry and Mr. Pippin's parents why they ain't coming back then come with you?"

"Oh, Sam." He frowned. I never say what he rehearses me as going to say. We've almost never had an argument, but when we do, he always loses, because of that.

"Sam, you're not like Merry and Pippin. You're in a different position."

And there the other part was, out. I was a servant, and they weren't.

I wrapped my arms across my chest and stared at the ground. My throat was swollen too much to talk, just then.

"Sam . . . "

He put his hand on my shoulder, but I kept looking at the ground, showing him this time it wouldn't work.

"Sam, I didn't say it to hurt you."

I knew that. That's why it hurt so much.

"Sam . . ." He was quiet again, for awhile. "You know, as long as I remember Hobbiton, I remember you. First you were playing in our garden while the Gaffer worked, and then you were working in it. As long as there've been Bagginses, there've been Gamgees working for them."

I waited.

""I'm not sure you'd ever do anything I told you not to, or refuse to do anything I told you to. You've grown up with me telling you what to do."

It seemed wrong, to be told I shouldn't serve him because I had always served him.

"Sam, you take it for granted you're here to do for me, and I'm afraid . . . I'm afraid that means you're not making a free choice. And if you were hurt or killed, and you hadn't made a free choice, don't you see that it would be my fault? And how could I live with that?"

I took his hand, and I looked at him, square in the eye, so he had to see me. His eyes were dry, but there was something about his mouth that I didn't like at all. Something I don't see much, from Frodo Baggins. Fear.

"Mr. Frodo," I began, and then shook my head. This wasn't a "mister" thing. "Frodo, you listen to me. You remember what Pippin said to Elrond, that he would have to lock him in prison, or send him home tied in a sack? The same goes for me, and more. Yes, there's never been a time Gamgees didn't serve Bagginses, and no, I can't see it starting now, but that isn't all there is to it, and you know it. We've been friends just as long as anything else, and you're not going into the wild and leaving me behind, because I won't have it. I'd follow you into Mordor, or to the moon, and that's the way it is. And if you order me to stay behind, I'll quit, so I won't be your servant, and then I'll come anyways. So that's my choice, and now you make yours."

Well, I knew he couldn't really make any choice other than the one the Council had already made. We were going South together. Everyone else was an afterthought, as far as I was concerned. Me and Mr. Frodo had been settled on going to Mordor since the first day.

And it would have been fine, too, if he hadn't had so much time to think. Mr. Frodo shouldn't be left alone to brood, because he's good at it. He can always think of the reasons for doing things and not doing things, and he always worries about other people. So I'd seen this coming - not the reason he'd come up with why I should stay behind, but that he would - for weeks now.

And I knew it would be me he'd want to leave behind, because Frodo loves me, even more than he loves his cousins.

Which is why I wasn't staying behind, servant or no.

Once I'd laid it out to him, he could see he didn't really have any choice about my coming that wouldn't take serious discussion with Gandalf and Elrond. And I thought Gandalf might be on my side, and I suspected Frodo thought the same.

"Very well," he said. "You can't say I didn't try."

"You tried very hard," I said, as kind as I could. "It's not your fault I'm as stubborn as they make 'em. It comes of being the youngest."

Frodo nodded. "I suppose I'm not really surprised, Sam. And I guess . . . well, I can't deny I'm glad you'll be along."

But I bet he wasn't as glad when we got to Moria. In fact, he must have found me a right nuisance.

The gentry made me leave Bill behind, and that was cruel hard. I know he wanted to come with us, and I wanted him there. Me and Bill were two of a kind - pack animals to most of the others, but with someone who thought we was more.

I was the one who thought Bill was more. And to let him loose, alone, to wander where there were wargs, wasn't what I would choose. But before I could think of an argument, something like a nest of snakes in the water grabbed Mr. Frodo, and it was go after Bill or stop the snakes.

That wasn't a choice. I used the sharp knife Mr. Bilbo gave me, and cut Mr. Frodo free long enough for the real fighters to get there. I dragged him inside, and then we were all trapped, because the snake-thing blocked the entrance.

That was the last straw for me. Still holding Mr. Frodo's arm, I just collapsed on a step in the dark. *"Poor old Bill!" I choked. "Wolves and snakes! But the snakes were too much for him! I had to choose, Mr. Frodo. I had to come with you."

And then I was overcome. It was all too much, Frodo almost killed and shaking with fear, and Bill lost in the wild, and crebain and the morgul blade and being locked in the darkness when I'd been afraid of our cellar when I was a little boy, and orcs maybe, who knows what else, and even lying next to Frodo for so many weeks now as if I was just an innocent child . . . I couldn't move, I couldn't breathe, I could only sit on that step and cry.

All the gentry were discussing what they'd do next, and then Gandalf said, "Follow my staff!"* and I tried to think how to move something and get up. But I was still holding Mr. Frodo, and he sat down next to me.

"Sam needs to rest a minute," he said, which was one way of putting it when I was sobbing on his shoulder.

"We need to be getting on," Strider said, and I tried to stand up again, but Frodo held me down.

"If you must, you'll go without me," he said right back to Strider, and you could tell he meant it.

"We can wait a few minutes."

There were some other arguments, but Mr. Frodo ignored them. He put his arms around me and petted me. "It's all right, Sam," he whispered, "It's all right. I love you." It's what he used to say when I was a little lad, and it used to help me stop crying, but here, in the dreadful hole, with him almost killed right in front of me, and love so much different for me than it used to be, it made me cry the more.

But after a few minutes, I felt better, and could feel Frodo's hand pushing his handkerchief into mine. The others had gone on up the stairs, I think, or at least Gandalf and his staff had, so no one could see us. I blew my nose and leaned my head on his shoulder for one more minute, just for the comfort, and felt his hair light on my face. I moved up in startlement, not quite sure where he was in the dark, and our lips brushed.

It was just the softest touch, and it didn't mean anything, but I thought I would faint. It felt so much like everything I'd ever wanted to happen but couldn't. I knew it couldn't, I knew Mr. Frodo still was thinking of me like that hobbit lad he'd comforted in his lap, and for him, he could have kissed me five times and all it would have meant was that he was sorry I felt so bad.

We helped each stand up, and then Mr. Frodo told Gandalf we was ready to go. So we walked up hundreds of steps (two hundred; we counted) and then Frodo wanted to eat, which from a hobbit point of view is always the best thing when there's trouble.

And then there was a long walk, me making sure I was right behind Mr. Frodo in case anything happened, and some big jumps too, over holes that looked like they went down to forever. I couldn't help thinking how Bill would have felt about them.

We paused to rest at last. I laid my blanket down and made sure Mr. Frodo didn't need any help with his. He put it next to mine, and we lay close just as we had in Rivendell.

"Poor Pippin," he whispered to me, as we huddled for the heat, and I agreed. Gandalf was punishing him with first watch, and Mr. Pippin was the littlest and already wore out from the walk.

"Are you all right now, Sam?" he asked next.

"Yes, sir. Mr. Gandalf was right - Bill wouldn't have liked Moria."

"Fortunately for us, Gandalf is always right." And he curled up and went right to sleep.

I wished I could sleep, but I was still feeling his lips accidental against mine, and his shoulder shaking as I pulled him away from the snake thing. All the time he had been petting me, he'd been shivering, and that was part of what had been too much for me. I had been wanting to put my arms around him, and wrap my legs around him, and comfort him and distract him and comfort myself too, by feeling him all alive under and around me. And I'd wanted to kiss him, every inch of him, make sure each of those inches of skin was all right and warm and alive and unharmed. I'd wanted to tell him I loved him and anything trying to harm him would go through me first. I wanted to show him how I loved him until he was moaning and gasping from something other than pain or fear, just for a change.

Instead, he was kind and gentle and considerate and loving and just like my older brother.

Oh, I knew I was ungrateful, not just to him but to fate. How many have as loving a friend? How many work for someone as kind? And here I was wanting more than both.

* * *

I wished I hadn't heard the discussion. I wasn't supposed to hear it, I'm certain, but Mr. Frodo didn't tell me to stay away, and I will always be close by if he doesn't.

We are fewer now. Mr. Frodo and me both took hurt in the battle with orcs in Moria, and Mr. Gandalf is dead. After he was killed, and we came out into the sun, we fled down past the Silverlode, and the two of us fell behind, for an orc had cut me, and another shoved a dirty great spear into Mr. Frodo.

Finally he put a hand on my arm. "We can't . . . keep up, Sam," he panted. "We might. . . as well . . . rest a bit."

I helped him sit on a rock, and sat by him. "I'll get some food out of my pack in a minute," I said. "You haven't eaten since morning. Are you bleeding?"

"No, just crushed from being between the hammer and the anvil*," he said. "Bilbo ... gave me his mithril armor that last morning we were together."

"Bless him." After Frodo had been stabbed by that spear, and we'd gotten a distance, he was so shaky I'd put my arms around him just to keep him standing, but I hadn't had time to even wonder why he was still alive.

Mr. Frodo was looking at my cut. "That's nasty. We'd best get water and clean it."

"In a minute. Has it stopped bleeding?" Funny, we were separate from all the others and yet it seemed quite natural, as if we were meant to be tracking through the wilderness, just the two of us.

"Yes, I think so. Though you've probably lost quite a lot of blood. Head wounds bleed a lot."

"I remember the time you fell out of the cherry tree and cut your head on a stone. I thought you was killed."

"Yes, and ran screaming back to Bilbo as I lay there begging you to come hide the cherries so he wouldn't know we were stealing them."

We laughed, and he leaned his head on my shoulder. "Well, we both fought today. I guess we're in an adventure after all."

"You were brave. You helped save us all. Boromir couldn't have shut the door if you hadn't stabbed that thing with scales."

"Bilbo would like to hear that Sting has been approved by Aragorn."

"He approved of you, too, 'Frodo son of Drogo'."

"Yes, and I approve of you, Samwise son of Hamfast. I saw the size of that orc you killed, and you did more than just stab him in the foot."

I would have argued that foot or belly, stabbing's stabbing, but I saw that the others had finally noticed we were not with them, and Aragorn and Boromir were coming back for us. So I nudged Frodo, and he pulled himself together and stood, still shaky enough I kept my arm around him as they come back.

That may have been what done it to them. At the time, Mr. Strider was kind as could be, and the Men carried us till they found a good place to set up for lunch and rest. But later, Frodo heard about it. And so did I, though I wasn't supposed to.

After a time we came to rest in Lothlorien. After a few days, Mr. Strider and Mr. Boromir came to find Mr. Frodo and said they "wished speech" with him, all formal like. So he went with them, and I followed, but I didn't let them know I was following, since I hadn't been invited and I was pretty sure Frodo just forgot to tell me not to come. It was clear to me from the way Mr. Boromir looked at me that I wasn't to come.

Where they went, Mr. Merry was already there, and didn't look surprised to see them neither. I didn't dare to get as close as I would of if there hadn't been any hobbits to hear, but I can be quiet when I choose, so I was close enough.

Frodo looked a little concerned, especially when Mr. Strider just stared at him a minute, as if trying to figure out how to start.

Finally, Mr. Strider said, "Merry?"

And Mr. Merry said easily, "Frodo, we need to talk about you and Sam."

I could see Mr. Frodo's face from where I was, and it closed right up tight.

That would have warned Merry, all right, but he plowed ahead. "We think the world of Sam, you know. This isn't about Sam, exactly."

I recognized the voice Frodo spoke with. It's the one he uses for Mistress Sackville-Baggins. Calm, and reasonable, and pleasant, but I wouldn't like to be the one it's aimed at. "And what is it about, Merry? Gentlemen?"

Merry looked like he wished he wasn't there, and Strider came in, real smooth. "It's about . . . distraction, and the danger that can come from that."

"Please continue." As cold as the Silverlode.

"Frodo, most of us on this journey are of a kind. We are equal in our expectations and our standards. But Sam is . . . vulnerable."

"Because he's a servant." Still cold and impossible to cross.

"Yes. His focus is on his service to you, rather than on the task. He's . . . emotionally involved. Look at his reaction to leaving the pack pony."

"You are suggesting that none of the rest of us are emotionally involved?"

"Not in the same way. But the point is, that makes you emotionally involved too, and you are the Ringbearer."

There was a long silence. "Go on."

"Frodo, you clearly understand the commitments master makes to servant, as well as the other way around. And so you treat him . . . much more carefully than you would any other member of the fellowship."

Like putting his arm around me when I was crying, and refusing to go on even when Gandalf said to follow, till I was all right.

Oh, they were right, and that hurt bad. I'll tell you straight, I don't like listening to my betters, and my Gaffer knew it, which is why he was always on me about it. And I knew Mr. Frodo might listen to them more than me, because he was raised with that kind.

"I'm very fond of Sam."

Merry trying again, then. "Yes, and you're very fond of us, Frodo. We're your cousins, and you love us. But sometimes you treat Sam like us, and sometimes you treat him like Bill, and between the two, you're always taking care of him one way or the other, and it's draining you."

"He takes care of me too!" Frodo snapped, and it was the first ill-temper I'd seen him aim at Merry since he was a tweener.

"Yes, but we all take care of you," Merry pointed out, and that was true. Frodo was mostly the only one to take care of me, but if I were gone, he'd still be cared for most ways. He does for himself just fine, so he doesn't really need me to roll up his pack or bring his ration. I just like doing it, and he gets so busy thinking sometimes, he doesn't remember. If he had to, he would.

"It seems to me," Boromir said, and his voice was kind, "you really need to decide if Sam's more like your cousin or your pack pony, and stick with it. And if you can't, then it would be safer for the Quest and for you to leave Sam here."

And that was it, then. All my betters come to the idea sooner or later I should be left behind, like Bill.

I looked at Frodo's face and it had gone white. Even I couldn't read it. I thought maybe he was going to faint, but from anger, or pain, or embarrassment, or something else entirely, I just couldn't tell.

The others saw it, but I guess they just decided they'd gone too far to stop. "Sam loves the elves," Merry said.

"They would treat him well," Strider said. "And he would be quite safe."

Then they waited, but if they thought Frodo was going to say anything to them, they didn't know him well.

Which they didn't, except Mr. Merry, which may be why he tried one more time.

"Or if you're that fond of him, and don't want to leave him, you can think of him as a cousin . . . " he began, and trailed off.

"I assure you, I do not think of Sam as my cousin," Mr. Frodo said, and stood, a little shakily. "I thank you all for this discussion, which I'm sure you initiated with the best of motives, and I beg your pardon, but I do need to . . . go consider the points you made." And he walked off hastily, but not very far, because I - well, we - could hear him throwing up in some bushes a distance away.

The gentry looked at each other. "Well, that went well," Mr. Merry said, not as if he really thought so.

"I couldn't imagine a way it would," Strider said grimly. "But it was needed."

"Should we have talked to Sam?" Mr. Merry's voice, thoughtful.

"He wouldn't understand."

"He understands a lot."

"He's too young. He doesn't understand the main problem."

And they looked at each other, and nodded, and they were right. I could see that they thought there was something else, something they understood and didn't have to say, and I couldn't imagine what it might be.

But it did occur to me that Mr. Frodo, as soon as he recovered a little, was going to be looking for me, and I'd better be farther from here and nearer to there, if you see what I mean.

I'd barely got back to the pavilion where we slept when Mr. Frodo stalked in. He was a sight. There was color flushed under his cheekbones, and his eyes were large, and he was breathing hard, and his faintness was gone and all that was left was fury.

He called to me softly, "Sam! Come here!" and I came, of course.

"Come on," he said. I followed him without a question, though he was walking twice as fast as usual, and we went through flowering meadows and woodland, gentle slopes and along rushing creeks, without stopping once to look at anything.

We walked maybe eight, ten miles before he slowed, hearing me panting. "Am I going too fast?"

"No, Mr. Frodo," I told him, though the thought came that if he went another mile I was going to have to lie down and wait for my breathing to catch up with the rest of me.

He smiled then, though his mouth was a bit twisted, and threw himself down on the silken moss. "Sam, dear idiot, won't you tell me the truth for once?"

"If you chose to run, Mr. Frodo, I'd choose to follow as long as I could. Why should you slow for me?"

"So I won't kill you?" But this time it was his real smile.

I lay there panting for awhile, and he was just as happy to rest too, I think.

"Sam, do you like Lothlorien?"

"It's a beautiful place." Of course, he'd have to ask, after that conversation.

"Would you like to stay here?"

"No master, of course not. We have to get the ring to Mordor."

He looked at me, and I could tell that the discussion had torn him up some, though he was trying not to show it. Well, it had torn me up a lot, but I wasn't going to tell him that. I'd rather be his cousin than his pack pony, any day. But I wasn't his cousin.

"You know, Sam, I depend on you so much. Maybe too much."

"How could that be, sir?"

"What if you weren't around?"

"That won't happen."

He sat there in the grass staring at nothing, and looked completely miserable.

I took his hand, and he pulled it away from me. That hurt more than anything.

"Sam, do you like being a servant?"

"I like being your servant."

He shook his head. "But . . . always doing for others. Knowing your place, as your gaffer taught you. Does that feel right to you?"

"Mr. Frodo, begging your pardon sir, but sometimes you think too much."

He looked at me then, and I wished he'd let me touch him. "That's what I mean, Sam. Begging my pardon before you say what you think."

"Well, does it feel right to you to say excuse me to Strider if you bump into him?"

"What?"

"It's the same thing. It's just being polite. "

"It isn't the same thing, and you know it. You're a servant."

"That's the second time you've said that just now. Are you feeling I don't know my place?"

Maybe there was more edge in my voice than I meant, because he looked at me real careful, and then frowned. "I think you've answered my question, Sam."

"Maybe." But he was right, because if I liked being a servant, I would be glad my betters were thinking of his safety, even if it meant they thought I should be left behind. And if I liked it, I would like it when he called me a servant.

But my likes and dislikes were a dangerous road to walk, and I had to be careful. I knew maybe he should leave me behind, and there was only one question that could decide that for me. And I couldn't ask if he wanted to leave me behind. I just couldn't.

"Do you like me being your servant, Mr. Frodo?" I had never thought to ask that before, long as we'd been together.

And I was shocked, because his answer came quick and emphatic. "No, I don't. I hate it."

And there we were, both hating the same thing from opposite sides. And nothing to be done about it.

We stared at each other, backed into a bad corner, and neither of us knowing what to do or what to say. He was one of them and I was . . . me. All alone, it seemed, after all.

But he looked away first. "I'm sorry, Sam. I shouldn't have dragged you on this walk with me. I need to think, and I'm just in the habit of thinking . . . with you there."

I nodded. "I think I need to walk for awhile by myself, sir." And I got up and walked away, hoping still he'd call after me.

But he didn't.

I spent the night in the woods. It was a little cold, but nothing much bad, and I'd got used to skipping meals on the road. I was too miserable to eat, anyways. I was too miserable even to think.

Mostly I just sat in a tight ball and felt.

It's such a big longing, wanting someone you can't never have. It's bigger than anything else, because it takes over everything. Your skin hurts, and your hands hurt, and your heart hurts.

It gets in the way of everything. The gentry were right. I couldn't take care of him proper, because the hurting got in the way.

More than the loving. I'm right fond of Mr. Merry and Mr. Pippin, though I mostly wouldn't tell them that, but it doesn't twist me up inside, the way wanting Mr. Frodo does. If either was hurt, I'd help. If they was lost, I'd look. If I needed their help, I'd ask. Even if it was just to hold me when I was sad, like after Mr. Gandalf died, I could just ask.

But not with Mr. Frodo.

And that's when it struck me - what that look between my betters had been, after Mr. Frodo left. It was knowing that.

I didn't think they'd seen my longing. I thought I'd hidden it right well.

But that's what it must have been, all the same, because nothing else got in the way.

And feeling like that, I shouldn't be with him unless he knew.

So he could make his own choices.

I was sitting with my knees to my chest and my arms around them, trying to get warm, and I just started rocking then. I would have keened if I hadn't been afraid the elves would hear. Oh, it would be the death of me, not being near him.

Better that than being the death of him, because he was treating me like his gardener when I was feeling like a lover and couldn't ask for the right thing at the right time.

I'd ask my betters for help right quick if I were in trouble. I'd called for Strider more than once on the road. But I wouldn't ask Mr. Frodo, because he might get hurt.

And I might help him when he didn't need it, and get in the way.

Oh, it was hard. It was hard. But the gentry was right.

It was a long walk back to the pavilion.

When I got back, everyone looked at me, but no one said nothing. I'm sure they noticed I'd been gone overnight, but no one asked where I'd been, not even Mr. Frodo, who'd moved his blankets next to his cousins'. They were talking among themselves, and I went to my blankets, and tidied them up, and met the others for meals, but stayed by myself otherwise, as was proper. I could feel Mr. Frodo's eyes on me, sometimes, but he didn't say nothing, and he didn't come over and talk to me neither, though he was as polite and kind as always, with me as with everyone.

Mostly I watched and listened to the elves. This was a magical place, though I didn't see them doing any magic. They sang less than the folks at Rivendell, but every step in Lorien was a song by itself. It did my eyes good just to look on things. And slowly, my heart was comforted, to think that there was something like this in the world still. My little problems was just mine, after all, nothing compared to the pain Frodo had with the Ring, or the world had with what the elves called the Enemy.

Then one morning I was growing restless, and it seemed like it was almost time to be moving on. I knew what I had to do, but I'd been putting it off, hoping it would change.

I had to tell Mr. Frodo how I felt.

Then we would go on together, or we wouldn't.

I felt his eyes on me that morning, and at breakfast he sat down next to me, which he hadn't done since that awful day.

"What are your plans for the day, Sam?" he asked, and it struck me how odd it was he should ask me. I would always ask, "What are we doing today, sir?" and he'd tell me.

"I thought I'd just follow the water upstream," I said. "Say goodbye to Lorien, like."

"You feel it too, then. The restlessness."

"Yes."

"I'll come with you, if I may."

"You're always welcome, sir." Oh, we was painfully polite, that morning.

I wondered what he'd have said if I'd said no. No point in wondering, though. I'd not say him nay, and he knew that. Nothing had changed that much, nor ever would.

The others watched us, out of the corners of their eye, as we packed a lunch and left.

It was a good morning. We talked of whatever came into our heads. Most of that was about home. I wondered if Tom Cotton had spoke to Marigold yet, so we talked about their courting, and he wondered if the earliest daffodils might be aboveground yet, so we talked about flowers. And so on.

Round noon we came to a place by the river which pooled almost into a small lake, and then rushed over rocks with a beautiful song. Right by the lake was a glade with elanor flowers blooming among short green grasses, and here and there flat rocks scattered, maybe even on purpose, making perfect seats and a table. We set out lunch there without discussing it, it was so perfect.

After lunch, we tidied up and stayed sitting on a stone at the edge of the water, just watching it flow for awhile. Each of us had things to say, and we knew it, and we were scared of hurting the other, and we knew that too, and it was worth putting it off just a little while longer and enjoy being together, like we hadn't been for days or maybe weeks.

Frodo began. "I've missed you, Sam."

"I missed you too."

"It seems to me the last thing I said to you could have been said better."

I picked up a rock and skipped it across the lake, three times before it sank.

"I said I didn't like you being my servant."

"I remember."

"But I didn't tell you why." I picked up another rock to skip, and he put his hand on my wrist and stopped me. "I was scared to tell you why."

I looked at him, and the rock fell out of my hand. All of a sudden, I couldn't breathe.

"I shouldn't probably tell you now." But he was looking at me, and I knew he was going to tell me. And for the first time I thought maybe, just maybe, what he was going to tell me might be something I wanted to hear after all.

"Do you remember in Moria, when we were sitting together just after we were trapped inside?"

"O' course."

"And we couldn't see each other, and . . . and your lips brushed against mine, by accident?"

"Yes, I do remember."

"Well. . . " he took a deep breath. "I thought about that a long time."

"You thought about it?"

"Not thought, I guess. Felt it. Kept feeling it."

He wouldn't look at me now at all, though I was trying to see into his eyes. "I felt it all through Moria. I felt it even in Lorien. I wouldn't let myself think about it, but I kept feeling it. I've felt things before, but they've gone away. This feeling just stayed and stayed, and I tried really hard not to think about it at all.

"And then, a few days ago . . ." We were coming to it. "Some of the Fellowship met with me. You remember the morning they fetched me."

"Yes," I said, wondering if I should tell him I'd listened. But he was struggling enough without interrupting.

"They wanted to talk to me about . . . you." I waited.

"Merry said I had to choose between thinking of you . . .like Bill, or like a cousin. And I told him I didn't think of you like a cousin."

And then he said, so softly I could barely hear, "I never wanted to kiss my cousins the way I wanted to kiss you."

He still wouldn't look at me, so I had to squinch down to get my face close to him. It was easier when I put my hand behind his head, because he raised it a little, and I could reach him then. I kissed him so gently it was as light as when we brushed lips by accident.

He reached his hand up, to pull my head down, I think, but then he brought it to my chest instead and pushed me away a little. Not hard.

"Sam, you don't have to kiss me just because I want you to, you know."

I shook my head and then, impatient all of a sudden, put my arms around him. "Don't be daft, Frodo."

Then I came to myself and started to apologize, but he laughed, so I left it.

"Really, Sam?"

"What do you think I was comin' here to tell you?"

"That you wanted to kiss me?" He looked surprised, but hopeful.

"Well. . . " I thought for a second, and then just told the truth. "To kiss you, for starters. Not just kissing. And not just kissing like what we just did, neither."

His eyes got wide, and I couldn't resist. I looked around, and there was nice green grass next to the rock, so I rolled over onto it, pulling him with me. And then I kept my arm around his waist, and showed him how I thought the kissing should go.

Somewhere in the middle of it, I had to come up for air. Just as well, because Frodo was having trouble breathing too. But he took to what I was doing right well, and after we got a breath, went willingly back to where we was.

He was wrapping his legs around my hips, too, tight enough I could feel he also thought kissing might be just for starters, or at least his body did. I could feel him hard beneath me. I kept my hands stroking his back, hoping he thought we'd had enough discussing.

But. . . he's Frodo. He finally pulled his mouth away from mine long enough to say, "But I'm not supposed to want to kiss my servant, either."

I laughed at him, and he glared a little. "Why are you laughing?"

"Because that's part of the speech you practiced, only you didn't plan on the middle part I put in."

Frodo looked sheepish. "I'm not as good at guessing what you're going to do. Less than usual, this time."

I knelt between his legs. "Tell you what, Mr. Frodo. I'll let you make your speech, if you'll let me say or do what I want at the same time."

"All right," he said, puzzled. "Of course you can, Sam. . . . At any rate, I need to tell you that . . .

unnnh!" I had just slipped my hand under his shirt and rested it on his belly. "I mean, we do need to be clear what our working rela . . . hnnnngh." I had his shirt off by then and was sucking a nipple.

He began to buck, trying not to, and trying not to laugh, and trying not to gasp, and also trying to finish his speech. Those were too many things at once, even for Frodo Baggins, and he finally settled on one, which was getting my shirt off. Which he did, though a button or two came as well.

"Sorry," he said, not sounding it. 'Mmmm, your skin feels good." Well, so did his, and our skin together felt about 10 times as good, like butter and sugar taste better mixed than separate.

I was sucking and licking my way down from the other nipple now, tasting his belly button and nuzzling the sparse little hairs below it. Any words Frodo had planned to use just then turned to gasps, which was good. My hands were busy with his britches buttons.

"Sa-a-m," he said, gasping, as I licked at the join of his legs, as I was pulling his britches down, "don't you think we should discuss this first?"

I raised my head and peered at him. It took a lot of will to do that, and then he made a noise, like he was protesting my doing what he asked. "What do you want to discuss, Mr. Frodo?"

"Well, for one thing. . ." I had his britches down below his knees now, so I moved my thumbs along his inner thighs as I was looking at him, stroking what lay between. He moaned and thrust, not even meaning to. I leaned down and lightly kissed his hardness, just below the head, and ran my lips underneath and down to the root. I waited for a minute for him to continue his discussion, but his eyes were shut and he seemed to be trying to remember what words sounded like. I thought he might remember what they were like with my mouth, so I took him in and swept my tongue around.

He yelled then, not too loud, but no words either. I used my hands to push upward and outward on each of his thighs, as I was using my whole mouth now to suck in the same rhythm. I felt him grab the hair on my head, figure out why that wouldn't be such a good idea if he weren't set on choking me, let go and then sort of flail helplessly, and thought to take pity on him. So I put one hand all the way around him to help my mouth along, and gave him my other to squeeze tight. Then his words came back, though in no particular order, and not much making sense. I noticed "Sam" a lot, and "meleth," and "love," and "oh!" once or twice, then he was bucking and gasping and I moved my free hand behind his rear and pushed up hard and he came, screaming loud enough they probably heard us back at the pavilion.

Which I hope they didn't.

While he was still jerking and gasping and spilling, he pulled at me and I climbed a bit north, and he wrapped his legs and arms around me again and buried his nose in my neck. He was shaking hard, and trying to talk again - I never knew such a hobbit for words - and saying mostly, "Oh Sam! Oh Sam! I never . .. I never knew . . I've never had . . Oh Sam!" It sounded good to me, anyway, so I wrapped myself around him and let him shake until he finally quieted down, still clutching my hips.

Then he said, kind of puzzled, "You still have your pants on."

"I was busy."

"Let me." And he reached down and began to work on the buttons. It was a bit difficult, since I was hard enough there was barely room for me, but Mr. Frodo is very dexterous. When he got his hand inside, he put it around me, stroking gently at first and then, as I moved against him, he got braver.

Oh, he felt wonderful, and in that position, he could kiss me on the mouth at the same time, and he did. I had always wondered what he tasted like, and now I knew, and would remember forever, but this time it was even better than the first time he kissed me. With his tongue, he stroked my mouth, and explored between my lips and teeth, and licked my lips inside and out, all the while I was distracted by much stronger feelings from his hand, which was pulling and squeezing by turns, with an occasional move of some other kind just to make me crazy. And then the heat started running through me, and my head jerked on its own, and I was squealing and embarrassed while he was laughing tenderly and never stopping his hand until I fell against him in those last shudders, not even able to hold on, making a sticky mess of my britches and his hand and the grass too, in a flood that felt like it would never end.

"Frodo. . . "

"Yes, love, I know." And he put his arms around me, stroking my head, his soft cheek against mine, just breathing with me.

Then we just lay on the grass in the sun for awhile, holding tight, surprised and yet not surprised at all, really.

Finally he got up and went to the lake and wet his handkerchief. He cleaned me up and fastened my britches, and then himself; then he put on his pants again and we moved to a dryer part of the grass. I sat against a tree, and he came and sat between my legs sideways, sort of like sitting in my lap but not as uncomfortable for me. I leaned my head on his and just sat there, glowing.

Finally I said, "Do you have more of that speech?"

"Hmm? Oh. Well, yes."

"Let's hear it then. We might as well settle this."

"I'm going to have to revise it a little."

"Say it like you planned. I'm curious."

"All right." He found places on my body to kiss first. "The problem is, Sam, I don't think of you as I would a cousin, and I don't think of you as I do a pack pony. I think of you as a person, and specifically, a person I want very much physically. And in every other way. Sam, I'm in love with you, and it's getting in the way of the Quest."

"You're in love with me?"

"I thought that would have been obvious after the last half hour."

"Dear Frodo." I kissed his eyes, them being handy, and the corners of his mouth. He blushed, probably because of telling me he was in love with me, and I said "I love you too, you know."

"I know." Then he took a breath and went back to his speech. I could tell he thought it was important, and he'd practiced it a lot. "I keep thinking about you, and how I feel about you, and how you feel about me. I worry about you, and try to think of ways to get close to you, and then I think if I'm close to you you'll notice how I feel, so then I avoid you. It's all mixed up and complicated, and it should be so simple. Either you love me or you don't. Well, I know you love me, we're very dear friends, but I don't know if you love me the way I love you, or even if you'd be horrified to know I feel that way. But if you do feel that way, we can just be very close friends and go on. And if you don't feel that way, I can accept it and move on, but at least I won't have to pretend. So . . . "

"Frodo," I said.

"Hmmm?"

"Was there really more of the speech than that?"

"About three pages. I wrote it out and memorized it."

"Is there any part I should know now you haven't said?"

He considered. "I guess not."

"All I was going to say is I was spending all my time hurting and longing, and it was getting in the way of taking care of you proper."

He sighed. "I spend two days and all that paper writing what you can say better in one sentence."

"I don't know better. I do know, faster." And he laughed, and kissed my hand.

"What did Galadriel offer you, Sam?"

"A bit of garden, and you. And you were offered?"

"You."

"Well, elves sure can be embarrassing."

He nodded. "So you're coming with me now, aren't you?"

"Always was."

"What am I going to tell the others?" And then he said, "I didn't explain this to you, but . . ."

"I heard them."

"You heard them?"

"I followed when they fetched you. What did you think I'd do?"

He shook his head. " 'Even if you're snoring.' " He'd threatened never to believe I was asleep again, after I'd listened to the elves at Woody End talk to him.

We started back, hand in hand. "You could just say nothing. They'll figure it out."

"How?"

I laughed. "Frodo, you've never done what we did, have you?"

He blushed. "No."

"We left all tense and nervous and hardly speaking. We're coming back all relaxed and happy. We won't be able to keep our hands off each other. We smell like sex. They'll figure it out."

Frodo looked at me. "We won't be able to keep our hands off each other?"

I took my hand away and hid it behind my back. "What do you plan to do?"

He grabbed me and put his arms around my neck. "All right, you've made your point. I guess the real question is if I'm going to get called aside to talk about not treating you like a servant again. Because I definitely am not treating you like a servant right now."

I was thinking about what they'd said. "You know, I'm not so sure they thought the problem was you weren't treating me like a servant."

"That's what it sounded like."

"Yes, but Boromir was the one who said it clear. He said you had to decide if I was your cousin or a pack pony. They didn't say I couldn't be your cousin. Just you had to have priorities."

I kept thinking, which meant I had to shush Frodo for a bit, and he kept licking my fingers so I gave up and put a couple in his mouth. "After you left, they talked about maybe they should have talked to me, but I was young, and wouldn't understand the main problem. And I think that they thought they were talking to you about the main problem, but you didn't get it, and they didn't understand why you didn't get it."

I thought for a minute. "The problem was, gentry don't understand the rest of us, because they're gentry. They thought you'd know more than me, because you're older."

"And because you're a servant." He had to let go of my fingers to say that, but just as well, as I was having trouble thinking.

"Not this time, love. They thought you'd know more about what we were feeling between us. There they were, being all tactful, saying 'take him to bed or put him in his place, but for heavens' sake, quit dallying around,' and you're totally lost. And I thought they'd noticed how I felt, but they don't notice servants much, so they'd noticed how you felt, which I should have, but the wanting was getting in the way of noticing, too."

"I gather from this conversation," Frodo said, and he sounded like he was grinding his teeth, "that you've ... er .. . had these experiences before."

I pulled him close, mostly because he was looking so embarrassed at being inexperienced. "I was wanting you, love. I've never kissed another lad, and not much more than that with a lass. But that doesn't mean I didn't have lots of chances to watch other people. Our homes ain't as big, and we live closer together than the gentry do. And we don't have the same rules about pretending."

"Well, what shall we do, then?"

"My guess is, nothing. Let them worry about it. It's none of their business anyway."

"Sam . . . " I put my hands under his shirt and held him close as he kissed me so hard my lip hurt at the end. He was rubbing against me hard too, and I thought we'd better decide if we were moving on or stopping for another half hour or so.

"Sam, you're never going to be my servant again. You know that, don't you?"

I licked the hollow of his neck and felt him begin to shiver under me. Oh yes, we were definitely going to be late for tea. "And how will I earn my living, then?"

"Well . . . all right, you're my gardener, but not my servant."

I quit teasing him. I knew what he meant. He was, after all, mine as well.

The only one of my betters I ever wanted.

End

**Author's Note:**

> Author Notes: * Indicates lines from Tolkien.
> 
> At the time I wrote this, I had just finished Tolkien's LOTR for the umpteenth time and was cheerfully convinced that I and every reader would recognize the Tolkien lines in it from their... sheen, I suppose. Years later, I found myself mistaken. I have tried to mark his work so you'll know it's not mine, but I'm afraid that's been difficult as my memory is not what I thought it was. If any of you recognize unattributed Tolkien work, PLEASE tell me so I can credit it. I followed his story in this quite closely, so there may be a lot.


End file.
